Selfhood and Otherness in Kierkegaard's Authorship

A Heterological Investigation

By (author) Leo Stan

Publication date:

11 October 2017

Length of book:

248 pages

Publisher

Lexington Books

ISBN-13: 9781498541336

This book investigates the polysemy of the category of otherness in Søren Kierkegaard’s authorship as a whole. Leo Stan identifies, expands upon, and discusses the interconnections between four different senses of otherness: the other within the human self, the infinite alterity of God, the paradoxical alterity of Christ, and the alterity of the human other. He also analyzes in detail the three stages of human existence: the aesthetic, the ethical, and the religious. His claim is that in its Kierkegaardian version, otherness can be understood only within the redemption-oriented framework of Christianity and in strict correlation with an ethic of singular persons.

Acknowledgments
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
Chapter 1: Otherness in the Aesthetic Sphere
Chapter 2: Ethical Self-Realization and Immanent Otherness
Chapter 3: A Soteriological Detour: The Problem of Sin
Chapter 4: Theo-Heterological Considerations: The Radical Alterity of God
Chapter 5: Kierkegaard’s Christian Heterology: The Paradoxical Otherness of Jesus Christ
Chapter 6: With(out) Others: The Place of Human Alterity in Kierkegaard’s Thought
Conclusion
Bibliography

[This book] is a very thorough survey of Kierkegaard’s primary works, as well as the relevant secondary literature on the focused issue of “heterology,” meaning the relationships of the person with others. . . . Overall, this is a very readable and thoroughly researched treatise on an important aspect of Kierkegaard’s thought. I recommend its purchase by academic libraries and scholars who have an interest in its subject matter.